Thanks Shadow - some great info in there.
I was thinking about 4-6gb myself. I have a nice desktop i7 system I built about a year ago with 4gb and it screams .... have been very happy with it overall, just wasn't sure as to whether it was worthwhile to invest in another i7 for the WHS system is is fairly low intensity as far as resources. Running a VM is not something I've done before though - I am assuming based on your reply the extra power will help me out there.
Thanks for the info on hot swappable. I guess it's not a 100% thing for me, but if costs were relatively the same (and thanks for the info as far as the boards go) I'd definitely favor that solution. I have a SATA backplate on my current server (based on an old P4 system) that works nicely and allows me front access to the hard drives. Theoretically it supports hot-swap, but the MB does not ... but it is nice when upgrading or removing old drives to be able to do that w/o having to get in the case, you know?
Most of the nice 4U racks, as you say, are pricey. I'll keep looking around; I'm not gonna build this until the new WHS comes out as my current old system works out just fine .... but some of the newer stuff I"d like to do requires a more robust setup, so planning for that right now ....
As far as regular cases, I do like the HAF932 - have had my eye on that before. Have you had good experiences with them?
I agree with you on consolidating to larger drives. My current system is a "Frankenbuild" with 5 drives of varying sizes (basically, left over). I built it because I could ... and I wanted to see how much use I got out of it. Turns out I use it a lot, love it, and want to have a more formal build .... so the impending release of a new WHS built has inspired me to give this system a more serious look ... the 3TB HDDs are the "Advanced technology" though, correct? I was under the impression that windows may not (does not?) support drives that big without formatting into multiple partitions?
Thanks for the help - very good info and I appreciate it.
Shadow703793 said:
^ Hmm... if you are going to run this as a VM you should have at least a Quad core. Something like a Phenom II X4/X6 or an Intel i7.
4-6GB should be enough, again depending on what you are doing.
Since you seem to absolutely want removable/hot swappable drives, you should get your original idea will work.
These are meant to go on a rack, but you CAN run these on top of a desk,etc if you choose to.
As far as the rack goes, you are probably going to have to pay quite a bit for a good 4U rack with hot swappable drives.
If you only have a few HDDs (4) something like this is your best option:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/ite...
or:
http://www.amazon.com/SUPERMICRO-Hot-Swap-Mobile-System...
(Personally, I'll trust the Supermicro over the iStar/Kingwin bays)
This will fit in to any good ATX case.
edit:
This is the cheapest I found:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-CFP52B-5-25-Inch-Conv...
$26.
If you get a full ATX case like a HAF932 you can get 2x of these drive cages and have 8 hot swappable drives.
edit 2:
Also, if you have multiple small HDDs, you are probably better off consolidating all of those on to bigger drives. We now have 3TB HDDs so you could potentially replace 3x 1TB drives with one of these. Yes, this cost money. But there are only a few options available for what you are trying to do. See below for more info.
edit3:
Also you should be aware that you MUST have AHCI in order to hot swap. Most boards ONLY have AHCI support on 1/2 - 3/4 of the available ports. Some boards have it on all. This is something you should take in to consideration when looking in to any hot swapping method, let it be drive cage or an actual rack.